Subject: Re: Harmony - proxies | asynchronous

[Brendan Eich]

On Sep 6, 2011, at 9:37 AM, John J Barton wrote:

> On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 11:01 PM, Brendan Eich <brendan at mozilla.com> wrote:
> Generators share with private name objects a right-sized (minimal but not too small) gap-filling quality that supports all of:
> 
> * prompt standardization,
> * interoperable implementation, and
> * library ecosystem builder upside far beyond what TC39 could ever do on any schedule.
> 
> They're in ES6 for good reason.
> 
> Unfortunately we are comparing a tiny number of generator programs written by experts to a unknown fraction of callback programs written by right-marching developers.

The question is whether an explicit keyword prefix operator, yield in the case of harmony:generators, is more winning than the rightward march with its readability and entrainment issues, once generator support is in the field enough. I'm betting yes, but we shall have to see.


> I think developers will be slow to take up generators, but on the other hand it's an important problem and one worth taking risks to explore.

The slow uptake is a given until generator support is widespread in the user agents banging on one's site. Some l33t sites may see heavy Chrome and Firefox share already, so in a year may dip their toes in the generator waters. Games already do this, to a fault ("works only in Chrome").

Thanks for the thoughtful comments.

/be
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